Right, because they’re so deterred by the law the forbids procuring a prostitute, but not the more severe ones prohibiting sexual assault?
That’s a good point. I would say that the sexual assaults and rapes are more in the heat of the moment as compared to procuring a prostitute which takes some deliberation.
I would say your attempt at drawing a conclusion between rape and prostitution as a solution to the problem of rape is pretty tenuous at best. Not that “prostitutes take too long to find so rape is what happens instead”.
So good it needed to be said twice.
Back in the first days of the SDMB on the web, as opposed to the SDMB on AOL, I had a lot of conversations with a guy with the handle of MarkSerlin. He was convinced that all women secretly wanted lots of sex, but they had to say “no” in order to feel good about themselves. Or something like that. His reasoning was that in the movies and in books and TV shows, guys who relentlessly pursued women were eventually rewarded with Getting The Girl. I kept telling him that what works in fiction doesn’t necessarily work in real life. If a show had a guy getting told no, and he didn’t pursue the woman, then it wouldn’t be much of a show.
The thing is, if men AND WOMEN are exposed to this sort of thing constantly, then it’s hard for women to say no and have it taken at face value. Both men and women will expect that a woman is supposed to say no the first time she’s asked, even if she’s horny as hell and is ready to rip his clothes off and have her way with him. Because if she says yes the first time she’s asked, she’s a slut. And if she says no too many times, she’s a frigid bitch. Either way, she’s shamed.
I remember a Reader’s Digest ad, saying something like “Don’t say no, say maybe” in regards to subscribing or renewing. The ad went on to say that in France, if a woman says no, she means maybe, and if she says maybe, then she means yes. Of course, this was back in the 60s or so. Still, the idea was that what a woman said was not what she meant.
This is complicated by the fact that girls back then were taught to be pleasant and agreeable, and we were supposed to go along with most of what boys and men said…except for sex.
I have to wonder what the guy in the original thread would have done if **MOL **had pulled out some pepper spray. Would he have accepted a no then? Is that what it takes, to get some guys to understand that no means no? If that’s what it takes, then men should not be offended when a woman clutches her pepper spray on an elevator.
I dunno about this. It’s possible for:
- A guy to be friends with women.
- He’s looking for a romantic relationship.
- If something that he thought was going to be a romantic relationship turns out not to be, the guy feels all sad about it.
- The guy would rather have no relationship than have a friendship that’s gonna make him feel sad.
I see no harm, no foul there. If you wanted a romantic relationship, and the other person doesn’t, you’re obligated not to treat it as a romantic relationship with neither bitterness nor recrimination. By the same token, if you wanted a platonic relationship and the other person doesn’t, you’re obligated not to treat it as a platonic relationship with neither bitterness nor recrimination.
So Bob goes out on a date with Judy. Judy has fun but isn’t attracted to Bob and lets him know. Bob needs to shut that shit down, then: no more hitting on Judy. But Bob can also let Judy know he doesn’t want a non-romantic relationship with Judy, and Judy needs to shut that shit down as well, and if she calls him an asshole, that’s just as bad as if he calls her a bitch.
There’s no obligation to be in a relationship, whether it’s a romantic one or a non-romantic one. And if a person is looking for a romantic one, that’s just as legit as a person looking for a platonic one.
Regardless of all the posturing, grooming, and social contortions we fall victim to, the word “no” ought to be heeded. We need a flow chart.
If you have common sense, respect for people and the law --> heed the No.
If she’s not returning your affections and admiration --> leave and find someone who likes you.
If she’s attempting to convince you of her chastity by feigning reluctance–> remember Relationship Rule Numero Uno: Don’t stick it in the crazy.
If she’s playing a game of chase me --> decide if a felony conviction is worth testing her resolve.
I don’t think that’s what we’re saying here. Surely every man isn’t attracted to and bent on consummating with all women. One of the problems that crops up here is that some men are so awkared, single-minded and asocial they have no female friends at all, and that seems to be the primary reason they are so mystified by relationships, cues, signals, etc. They approach only the women they find attractive and attempt to coax a romantic relationship out of every encounter with a woman, including the women who have shown no romantic interest in them.
They don’t see women as people, but as a means to their end so it’s not surprising when they become bitter and disillusioned.
Fair enough. I guess I didn’t see posts that suggested people who have no female friends at all, but I may well have missed them.
On a slightly related note, the original thread is banned, and it’s now got an ugly stepchild in ATMB.
Only hinted at here when MOL made it clear she was trying to be a good friend by offering the courtesy while he waited for a cab, and several guys insisted that her nice gesture iindicated a willingness to knock boots. Which, presumably, they wouldn’t have assumed if a dude had invited them to wait indoors.
But the topic of avoiding female friendships has come up many times in related discussions. Couple posters confirmed they avoid making friends with women at all costs because they have a habit of falling in love with every woman they interact with, a few have said they have zero interest in anything but romantic attachments to women, and the multi-volume encyclopedic “Friend Zone” edition tells all. In my opinion, this is a root cause of the misunderstandings like this. If you have no familiarity with women outside of Hollywood or internet dating coaches, you can’t be expected to be a good friend, boyfriend, date, or man, frankly.
I think you have the right of this debate so far(to say the least), so don’t take this the wrong way, but the bolded above is curious to me. Why would anyone approach someone–in a romantic sense, anyway–that they don’t find attractive?
Was that clause meant to say that these Nice Guys only approach women they find attractive (and no one else ever for purposes of friendship, general conversation, or the myriad reasons that one human being might speak to another) or that these whiny, inexperienced, socially clueless fellows fail to realize their own general playing field (so to speak) and act accordingly?
Or something else? Just curious.
Are you attracted to your male friends? (assuming you’re straight)
Upon edit, I’m not sure I understand you here. The problem as I see it is that some guys only approach women with the intent of pursuing a romantic relationship, and not for any other reason (friendship, companionship, good working relationships, networking, etc). They don’t consider women as people at all, much less as friends. Women, to those guys, serve only one purpose.
I’m a straight man.
I think you answered my question. The first of the two clauses… you’re saying that these guys only approach women with sex in mind and not with any other possible intention of getting to know them as people. I think the confusion for me was in the use of the term approach, since I think it’s obvious that one should only try to romantically approach someone that they know something about or at least like something about in that way–but yes, it is a problem if that is the only way in which someone sees someone of the opposite sex (or same sex, or whatever floats your boat).
Not to mention that for many rapists the lack of consent and the knowledge that you’re in command and control is almost certainly part of the motivation.
It’s not just a cliche to say that rape is more about power than sex.
Yeah, we’ve got each other here. I should have said "Men who have no female friends seem to regard women as holes rather than *people *.
Bars call cabs for people even at closing times. In fact, bars specifically call cabs for people at closing time, because they want the cab to get there so people will leave. They could have asked the bartender to call the cab before they ever stepped outside. They didn’t have to wait until they got to her place to call the cab. If they’d asked for a cab when Last Round was called, there’d have never been any need to proceed to her apartment and wait around.
None of that is meant to excuse the Dumb & the Desperate, of course.
Good deal.
Wow three pages in under 24 hours. Impressive.
This is an excellent explanation of the cultural environment that leads to fucked up attitudes about sex. One of the results of this is that there is a subset of women that want to have sex but don’t want to feel like their sluts. The solution for them is that they want to be talked into it. It’s fucked up, but it’s a real phenomenon. I have no idea how common it is, but some variation of that attitude has been present in three of the girls I’ve slept with. Since that represents about 30% of the people I’ve slept with, I can only assume it’s relatively common.
So the reality is that no does not always mean absolutely no. It can mean, “yes, but I want you to be the instigator”. It can mean, “maybe, I want to fool around a bit and see how it goes first”. It can mean, “I want to fool around a bit but not have sex”.
I know what the reaction is going to be. And that’s “I don’t do this and neither do any of my friends”. Well, I’ve never raped, sexually harassed, drugged, or assaulted a woman and neither have any of my friends. Yet, these things happen. The logical explanation for this is that either my friends don’t do these things, but other people do, or that my friends do these things but don’t admit to it.
So here’s how I’ll put it. I can count the number of people I’ve slept with using both my hands and I’ve heard (paraphrased for brevity):
I wanted to sleep with you but I didn’t want you to think I’m a slut
I want to sleep with you, but I’m a good girl
I’d rather booty call my ex because I don’t want my number to go up
I never make the first move (sexually). That’s the man’s job.
If we’re just friends and sleeping together, that makes me a slut
You can think I’m lying or that there’s something wrong with these women, but neither would be correct. I’m not lying and these women are otherwise normal appearing college educated professional women.
Got it. So it’s a good idea to ignore what someone has explicitly stated to you because she might be secretly be thinking something else.
Plenty of sexual assaults and rapes are planned in advance. A man who’s just really horny does not, “in the heat of the moment”, pick out a victim and follow her, tamper with her drink, or threaten her with a weapon. These are not features of all rapes, but they’re fairly common and take at least as much deliberation as just calling an escort service.
And to be clear here, the “no” I’m referring to is along the lines of “Want to come up for coffee but no sex”. If you are trying something, a “no” definitively means stop.